Christmas letter 1990
Hi December 19, 1990
I hope your past year has been as fine as mine. My life rolled along enjoyably and terrifically satisfyingly until my summer romance crashed to an untimely end. I hope you enjoy this recounting of my escapades.
Mom continues to enjoy good health. Last winter I rented the apartment directly below her. This winter my apartment is ten blocks away. We eat breakfast and dinner together and I walk her to the bus stop weekdays.
Last winter I enjoyed running and basketball (noonball) three days a week. I suffered sprained ankles (5 times), jambed thumbs and fingers, a pulled back muscle and irritated knees. The game is still SO MUCH FUN.!! If the injuries got a couple of days of rest, I felt GREAT.! I felt like a kid again. Life is amazing and wonderful!!! and !!! and !!!
My alma mater won the high school basketball state championship. I watched all the games and talked with several classmates. It was VERY exciting.
I wasted about three man-months doing one 5,000 piece jigsaw puzzle, a reproduction of Rembrandt's painting, 'The Night Watch'. Dark pieces only.
In April, Linda and John were considering if they knew anyone dumb enough to drive a rental truck 2000 miles on a lark. Of course they thought of me immediately. I hitchhiked to New Hampshire and back from Albuquerque.
Hitchhiking went smoothly. The longest rides were from from Highland, Illinois to Scranton, Pennsylvania - 800 miles - and from Albuquerque to Joplin, Missouri. A beautiful blonde woman driving a sports car gave me a ride in Connecticut. She relies on her instincts and intuitions. She has picked up only three hitchhikers in her entire life. I did thank the barber here who so successfully made me look 'clean cut'.
I arrived in southern New Hampshire quickly enough and enjoyed quality visits with several friends from college. When I called to tell John that the truck was on the way, I felt compelled to thank him for asking me to move his mom.
In Amarillo, Texas I stopped to eat a 72 ounce steak dinner advertised as 'Free if you can eat it in one hour.' I chewed and swallowed delicious steak for a whole hour but still had one and a half pounds leftover. It cost $30 and my picture appeared in the local paper. Record time is 11 minutes.
I joined Linda, John and the Sierra Club on a hike into the Grand Canyon. Hiking in the Grand Canyon always amazes me. The landscape changes, the temperature changes, the vegetation changes and parts of the trail are unnerving. This time the barrel cactii were blooming in brilliant shades of red. Other plants had bright yellow, or vivid red or even orange blossoms. Some were a delicate pale purple, some few were blue. One stream rose from the ground, flowed over a rocky area for about a half mile and disappeared into the streambed again. We swam in a deep, cool pool halfway though the second day's hot hike in the depths of the canyon. Our fisherman caught a beautiful, delicious trout during the second evening when we camped beside the Colorado River. On the far side of the river was a standing wave eight feet high. Surges caused splashes another six or eight feet high. The hike out was eleven miles long and four thousand feet up. Half way out I thanked John again for all the fun. The trip out vindicated my winter athletics.
Saturday, May 12, was my 43rd birthday. Mom invited my siblings and they all showed up. We had a fine party (no candles on the cake and no one tried to spank me.) Everyone gave me something edible - my favorite gifts.
The trip west this summer was motivated by friends in Moab, Utah who needed a housesitter to free them to play in the South Pacific. John and Linda then convinced me to join them on a Sierra Club trail maintenance trip. At the last minute, the housesitting job fell through. The trail maintenance was great fun. I enjoyed flirting unabashedly with the assistant trip leader (and still do) and became romantically involved with another trip member. (We met on the sly to avoid becoming the topic of campfire conversation.) That romance still continues although we both are skeptical about our compatibility for living together.
That trip kicked off another wonderful western summer full of hiking and camping and even an excellent romance. Unfortunately, she fell in love with a friend of twelve years (during which time she had been married).
My partner in this summer romance is a very strongly motivated outdoors woman, so we hiked or camped nearly every weekend. We seemed VERY compatible to me. Our first date was hiking in the Jemez River down a box canyon near Los Alamos, New Mexico. Once I sank in water up to my neck. Later we attempted to hike to the 14,000 foot summit of Kit Carson Peak in Colorado. We took the wrong route and got caught in a hailstorm near the ridgeline. The lightning was AWESOME. The mountainside was steep and became treacherous in the hail. Another weekend we spent eight hours in a cave near Fort Stanton, NM. There is an interesting mud sculpture at the end of the cave.
I was devastated by the termination of my summer romance. For two months I was obsessed with thoughts of her. It seems likely that it will be a long time before I find another woman so compatible. That frequently makes me sad.
After we "broke up" I visited Acoma, the 'sky city', and Chaco Canyon. Acoma proved to be interesting and fun. The Anazazi indian culture in Chaco Canyon is incredibly impressive. I joined friends to hike in the desert wilderness of Aravaipa Canyon in SE Arizona. I continued hiking in the Grand Canyon, Zion and Canyonlands.
It was a good year for wildlife sightings. I saw three mountain sheep with a full curl to their horns at Aravaipa and one evening we watched 44 coati migrating. I saw a bull elk bugling and guarding his harem in the Pecos. A ringtail (cacomistle) invaded my pack and tried to swipe my loaf of bread in the Grand Canyon. I saw another one crossing the road near Santa Fe.
I'm in Belleville, Illinois for the winter. Spending time with Mom and playing basketball are great motivators for me.
The genealogy computer program will be ready to market 'soon'.
Does anyone have any viable suggestions for meeting compatible women here? I'd like to find an avid hiker and camper although there are few places to enjoy those pursuits here. I've put an ad in the personals column.
Next summer I'm planning to hike the Appalachian Trail. It should be very relaxing, great conditioning and wonderful fun. Is anyone interested in joining me?
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Rambo family genealogy, Bankston & Bankson family genealogy, the Camblin family genealogy, the Dorsey Overturff family, cousin Jean's Schenck and Hageman genealogy, and